When multi-sampling techniques are used to produce anti-aliased images the amount of processing for each pixel may increase as the number of samples per-pixel increases. For example, a processing thread typically processes one sample of a pixel according to a set of shader instructions. Therefore, the number of times the shader instructions are executed by a processing thread for a pixel equals the number of samples per-pixel.
In addition to increased processing, the amount of bandwidth that is consumed to transfer data between different processing units within a graphics processor also increases. The increases in processing demand and increased bandwidth consumption may result in decreased graphics processing performance and/or increased system cost.
Thus, there is a need for addressing the issues of increased processing and increased bandwidth consumption and/or other issues associated with the prior art.